


there is magic upon your skin

by meios



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Dragon Age Kink Meme, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-27
Updated: 2015-01-27
Packaged: 2018-03-09 07:17:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3241076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meios/pseuds/meios
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>...and it is holy and one with you. It is everything that I can imagine and everything that I cannot. It is a void that draws all that come near it inside. It is all that I can do to keep myself whole around you, for you are stronger than the craters in the sky, the holes in the stars above.</p><p>You will win, my heart. You will survive.</p><p>You have to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	there is magic upon your skin

There is a man before her.  
  
And he is ancient, carrying an air of something untouched, forgotten but also not, and he speaks the tongue with a practiced charisma, and he looks down his nose at her, golden eyes and defensive statures and the whispered translations from Solas, from behind her. But she finds that she does not need them, and she holds her hand up to stop the older elf, gaze never breaking from the sentinel behind the ornate railing.  
  
“ _There is magic upon your skin_ ,” she says, the words no longer foreign to her, coming to her like a dream might. “ _Servant of Mythal, I beg for your pardon_.” She curtsies because it is the most logical thing to do, and the ancient elf almost seems to smile for a fraction of a second, less than a heartbeat.  
  
He remarks upon the trials that they took, ignoring all others, appearing to be mesmerized in the same way she had become. The words are like a game, in a way, in how his mouth moves around them, in how she listens, pointed ears perking some. He has similar  _vallaslin_  as her, green versus black, faded and clearer, like watercolors versus acrylic paints.  
  
He offers the guidance of another sentinel. Morrigan flies into a rage, quite literally.  
  
There is magic upon her skin, and it kisses her with each step.  
  
***  
  
** His eyes are golden. She only realizes this when they stand before the  _Vir’abelasan_ , and his name is Abelas, and he is sorrow.  
  
He does not take her hand, nor does he remark upon the whiteness of her hair, how it flows over her shoulders like snowfalls. He does not mention the paleness of her skin or the slight discomfort that the anchor brings into the air, though it is tangible, tasting of lightning strikes, to the both of them.  
  
He looks at her, and she looks back.  
  
And she offers him a place in Skyhold, in the Inquisition, and he turns her down; her heart somersaults in disappointment at that, but she understands, nodding, returning his smile when he gifts her with it.  
  
She drinks from the well and Solas lies about wishing Abelas a new name.  
  
***  
  
** The whispers in her head speak elvish, and she understands.  
  
They speak her name during meetings with her advisers, and she finds herself answering more often than not, the voices growing stronger with each and every sentence that she manages to decipher. She keeps herself busy as they attempt to locate Corypheus, the final battle approaching, the anchor throbbing in her palm as days pass. She fixes the fortress as much as possible, answering to  _Medb_  as often as she can, though she cannot usually discern whether she hears it with her ears or with her mind most of the time.  
  
And he returns.  
  
He says her name and she wonders aloud as to why he took her offer now, instead of then, and though he does not have an answer for her, he does take her hand this time, in the Great Hall before her throne, in the heart of her castle. She does not question whether his voice is real or imagined, because she watches his lips move, feels the ministrations of his words in the air like diamonds, and Abelas speaks in such quick elvish that she must force herself to comprehend it.  
  
It is private and it is intimate and it is sincere.  
  
***  
  
** Medb watches him train, magic bending at his will in ways that no mage she has ever met has been able to do, not even Solas, though he seems to understand the ways in which Abelas wields the Fade, the fragments of their power and dreams, comprehension of something so vast and unknown that no one, it seems, has the answer—all of the answers.  
  
She plays with the will-o’-the-wisps that Cole attracts, playful and not so much invasive as they are simply curious, without manners, and she knows that he watches her, blue and greens floating around her, sometimes enough to sweep her off of her feet and carry her down from the battlements to the ground below. She knows that he has smiled at the display more than once, if Dorian’s mirth at such gossip is to be trusted, which it is, always.  
  
They play with each other, toying at the edges of the prickling something in the air between them, all lingering fiery touches and grounding smiles, private whispers as the Inner Circle travels to one region or another, searching for clues surrounding the Red Templars, the betrayal of the Wardens against Divine Justinia. And even if she does not worship the humans’ Maker, she will keep her promise: she will have justice.  
  
And she kisses him in the dead of night, when only the insects are awake under the glow of the moon, the both of them silent, speaking through touches that only the trees in the Emerald Graves are witness to. His hands, free of their gauntlets, touch her cheek, trace the bone there until it has met her jawline; Abelas is solid while she is fluidity, wrapping around him like a ghost would a grave, and she does not wish for him to find a new name, because he has found his identity in it, within the earth that he has been a part of for thousands of years now. Medb runs her fingers through his tied up hair, easing it out and down, his hood following, and she calls him her heart through a gasp, a grin, and he calls her his love, and it works because it feels as if this meeting of the souls has always been, always will be.  
  
***  
  
** He takes her and she chokes on the response, arching off of the mattress in her quarters, into him, against him, writhing as they come apart and together, melting into one corporeal figure, idol, and the whispers of the well are wailing; they are thunder as  _they_  become lightning, and she claws at his back, drawing new branches across the tattoos that cover him like they do her. He is solid and he holds her through everything, whispering things that mean everything into her ear, breath hot, tickling, too close but not close enough.  
  
There is only Abelas and in another world, another moment, she would find it rather amusing to be shouting his name, muffled into his shoulder with teeth and mouth and bites that leave marks in the morning. She shouts  _sorrow_  and she vaguely wonders if the Creators can hear her now, from wherever they are.  
  
The air is thick and barely breathable as she tugs Abelas down to her when they find their bodies only twitching and not attempting to break themselves, congeal into something else entirely. She kisses him and there are truly no words to describe how badly her heart aches when he brushes his nose overs hers, when he moves to lie beside her rather than on top of her and tucks a tendril of hair behind her ear.  
  
He is gentle, intense, the eye of a hurricane and the storm around it.  
  
“ _There is magic upon your skin_ ,” she whispers, thick and sleepy, though her eyes are so very awake, so very aware, and Abelas smiles, hums amusement. “ _There are tombs behind your eyes, and yet they glow with life that has not yet become life, and, my heart, each scar that I find on your flesh, on your mind, is a scar that I love, one that I cherish just as I cherish you_.”  
  
Medb brushes her lips over his knuckles, smiles when he squeezes her fingers.  
  
“ _You will win_ ,” he murmurs, gathering her up, her head resting upon his chest, and she looks at him, craning her neck to see the twitch of his mouth at the corners. They often speak without their voices, but she understands why this is being heard, told to the air and the fire and the bed, to her hair, her scalp. She understands why he holds her just a little closer, a little tighter.  
  
“ _He is no match for you_ ,” continues the ancient elf, voice a rumble of thunder, touch a shock of electricity. “ _You will smite him like one of the Creators themselves, and the humans will tell stories of the elf that saved them all for millennia. You will win. You will come back and you, my love, will go further. Mythal’s blessings are upon you now; you have the world at your back, the_ worlds _at your beck and call_.”  
  
She switches to the common tongue, the next day’s journey daunting and the following battle petrifying to simply think about. She knows she is capable, powerful, able to take down the false god of the Deep Roads, of the Black City, of ancient Tevinter, and yet, still, she trembles. She switches to the common tongue and asks, “But what if I don’t?”  
  
“There is no ‘what if’ in this situation,” he whispers.  
  
“There’s always a ‘what if’,” Medb replies, eyes fluttering closed, hand covering his own. He takes them again, twines their fingers together, squeezes tight. “I was the ‘what if’ in the beginning. I am still the ‘what if’ in this so-called legend.”  
  
Abelas shakes his head.  
  
“You disagree?” she murmurs.  
  
“Mythal chose you specifically, did she not? According to your encounter with her vessel?” Upon Medb’s answering nod of the head, he kisses her hair, continues: “Perhaps your journey to the temple was not as predicted, or perhaps it was. Our meeting was fated. We have both agreed on that, no?” She confirms it. “The Inquisition was fated to come into fruition. The false god would have found another way had you not thwarted him multiple times.  
  
“You have always been the only one able to stop this madness, Medb,” whispers Abelas, mouth to her ear now, the both of them shifting to rest beneath the blankets, taking advantage of the luxury before the Inquisition rides on the morn. “It would always fall to you, no matter the path that was taken.”  
  
“You do love to put the weight of the world upon my shoulders,  _ma vhenan_ , don’t you?” she chuckles, humorless, and he grazes his fingernails over her stomach to make her truly laugh, to squirm. Medb hits him, playful, and when she meets his eyes again, it is with the same warmth that they are generally filled with, overloaded, trickling over like water.  
  
“You know what I mean,” is what he says, simple, precise.  
  
“I do.”  
  
*****  
  
She comes back.  
  
He meets her on the steps in Skyhold, amidst the cheers of those that had remained, the troops that can see her from where they are, her advisers, her friends. The absence of Solas stings, yes, and her theories seem to be coming into fruition the more that she dwells on it, but not right now, no, not when she flings herself at the ancient elf, not when he catches her and lets her wrap her legs around him.  
  
If anyone, the Bull or Josephine or Dorian, for instance, were to ask her afterwards if she had cried, hid it in Abelas’ neck, she would scoff and make a joke, her tears a secret upon his flesh, his hands clutching her lower back, keeping her aloft, closer than close, and perhaps there is silence when this happens. Perhaps Skyhold can hear her choked back sobs, the adrenaline making her hyperemotional. She clings to him and he returns the urgency of touching.  
  
He is solid and she is fluidity and she wraps around him like a ghost does to a tomb.  
  
He calls her things like his heart, his girl, his one love. He tells her that he loves her, and though the words have been felt, they have never been said, and she finally allows herself to fall, kisses him with all of the strength that she can muster.  
  
This is probably not the display that should be witnessed from the Inquisitor, the Herald of Andraste, the Peacemaker of the Orlesian Civil War, She Who Ended the Mage Rebellion, Slayer of Corypheus, the False God. This is probably not very professional, polite, a number of things, but she cannot bring herself to care.  
  
They are all alive. She is alive. He is alive.  
  
He kisses her deeply, and her hands push the hood off of his head, if only to bring him closer, palms pressed to the back of his skull. There are tears on her cheeks, and she can feel droplets from his eyes mix with her own.  
  
When they break apart, she can only bury her face into his chest, attempt to breathe out a certain rhythm that is not so much hyperventilation as it is relief after relief, a sigh in a way, something that flows through her as she regains her composure.  
  
And in the Great Hall, where he had taken her hand for the first time, she gathers with their friends, eyes lingering on the spot that Solas may have taken, before allowing the joy of the night to overtake her. She sips from a goblet of wine as she watches Iron Bull and Sera attempt to dance, Blackwall eventually being roped in before escaping to find Josephine, mingling and flirting, shuffling around each other like teenagers. Dorian speaks in hushed whispers to Cullen, Cassandra speaking with Varric, with Vivienne, as Leliana shares a story with an enraptured Cole. Morrigan smiles as Kieran runs over to Iron Bull, asks to dance too. He is scooped up, and for once, Morrigan has an aura of peace.  
  
She speaks and bows her head and laughs louder than she has allowed herself to in years now, and with magic at her fingertips, she interrupts Cassandra and Varric to invite the former to dance, a grin splitting her face, a hand offered. And they do for a moment or two before succumbing to their laughter, stumbling far too much in order to attempt a rash waltz, if that had even been what they had been doing.  
  
She is not drunk, no. But Medb is happy, mirthful, and in the company of her friends and only her friends, her comrades, she allows herself to forget her title for a time, spinning in the dress she has changed into, harmless sparks eliciting from her outstretched hands. She is alive. The bright green of the anchor remains on her left palm, but the blues overshadow it, for once. The will-o’-the-wisps come out of hiding and join her, and she can hear Iron Bull praising the display, Dorian wolf-whistling. Someone picks her up to add variety in her height, and she opens her eyes to find that it is Sera.  
  
Giggling, almost, she feels like a child again. The wisps float to the ceiling, eliminating the candles on the chandeliers, on the statues. There is only blue light, magical light, and Medb pauses to stare, to gaze.  
  
There are cakes and there are cheeses with meats and breads nearby. There is wine and there is whiskey, liquor with names that she cannot hope to pronounce, and the general mood of the fortress increases in vigor, in intensity, in happiness as the night goes on.  
  
But it is Abelas who finds her near the door to her quarters, follows her when she pointedly leaves.  
  
They kiss on the balcony overlooking the snowy oasis that is the mountain they live upon. It is slower than their previous one, with no pressing concern or audience around them now, his hand, dry and warm, on her cheek, while she touches his bicep, all feather kisses at the edge of her fingers, breathing into the fabric of his clothing, no armor, no walls, just him.  
  
There is only Abelas. There is only Medb.  
  
“ _There is magic upon your skin_ ,” he murmurs, every word something felt with her lips still on his, and she shivers as her words are shifted back to her. And he means it, and that is what threatens to bring her to tears again, and they are so close and she is so happy and cannot stop smiling, can feel his grin stretching and growing in response. “ _It dances on your hands, kisses your mouth when I am not. It runs through your veins; your voice is laden with it, and the spirits flock to you like bees to honey. They know your soul to be strong, kind, bright. Magic tickles your mind, pillows your falls, and I love you. I will always love you_.”  
  
There is a heartbreaking touch of the lips, and she is most certainly crying again. She does not bother to wipe them away, to do anything but whisper that she loves him too as the wind whips around them, but the cold is nothing, and she takes his hands, pulls him back to her quarters—their quarters, rather, flicking her wrist to close the glass doors.  
  
The sun has risen when they finally rediscover the bed, words interrupted with kisses, the fire dying, barely embers now.


End file.
